hat action could touch the
case?--the most difficult that a man can have to deal with. Through the
night Basil alternately walked the floor and knelt down, sometimes at
his study table, sometimes before the open window, where it seemed
almost as if he could read signs of that invisible sympathy he was
seeking. The air was a little frosty, but very still; he kept up a fire
in his chimney, and Basil was not one of those ministers who live in
perpetual terror about draughts; it was a comfort to him to-night to
look off and away from earth, even though he could not see into heaven.
The stars were witnesses to him and for him, in their eternal calmness.
"He calleth them all by their names; for that he is strong in power,
not one faileth. Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and speakest, O Israel, My
way is hid from the Lord, and my judgment is passed over from my
God?"--And in answer to the unspoken cry of appeal that burst forth as
he knelt there by the window--"O Lord, my strength, my fortress, and my
refuge in the day of affliction!"--came the unspoken promise: "The
mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall
not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be
removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee." The minister had
something such a night of it as Jacob had before his meeting with Esau;
with the difference that there was no lameness left the next morning.
Before the dawn came up, when the stars were fading, Basil threw
himself on the lounge in his study, and went into a sleep as deep and
peaceful as his sleeps were wont to be. And when he rose up, after some
hours, he was entirely himself again; refreshed and restored and ready
for duty. Neither could anybody, that day or afterwards, see the
slightest change in him from what he had been before.

He went out and attended to his horse; the minister always did that
himself. Then came in and changed his dress, and went through his
morning toilet with the usual dainty care. Then he went in to see Diana.

She had awaked at last out of her slumberous stupor, sorry to see the
light and know that it was day again. Another day! Why should there be
another day for her? what use? why could she not die and be out of her
trouble? Another day! and now would come, had come, the duties of it;
how was she to meet them? how could she do them? life energy was gone.
She was dead; how was she to play the part of the living, and among the
living? What mo